"Moderation" In Moral Education Thought And Its Contemporary Value

As one of the Confusion classics, Moderation contains abundant moral education and it is of great enlightenment significance to the current moral education in the aspect of the goal, the content and the approaches of moral education.Concerning the goal of moral education, Moderation unfolds itself from two aspects, which are “sincerity” and “attaining a state of harmony”. “Sincerity” refers to being sincere and honest, while “attaining a state of harmony” refers to social harmony. “Sincerity” shows an indefatigable pursuit of people for moral cultivation in Moderation, while “attaining a state of harmony” is Confucian’s pursuit of the syncretism between heaven and man and it is a harmonious state of everything. “Sincerity” is the premise of “attaining a state of harmony”, while the common pursuit of the two is the syncretism between the heaven and the man. As to the content of moral education, Moderation explains “the three virtues” of cultivating one’s moral character for gentleman, wisdom, benevolence and bravery and how to cultivate the “five virtues” of reaching one’s accomplishment during interpersonal relationship and the “nine classics” of governing the country; as to approaches of moral education, Moderation mainly involves with starting from reality, learning by doing and being sincere without absurdity. Starting from reality include: being content with things as they are, starting from trivial things and doing things properly; learning by doing mainly includes: the unity of learning and doing without being tired; being sincere without absurdity includes: cautiousness, introspection, tolerance, care for the surrounding, respecting morality and studying hard.The modern significance and reflections of the moral ideas in Moderation include: from the significance of social morality construction, self-cultivation is beneficial to the improvement of the current people’s ideological and ethical standards; neutralization is conductive to constructing harmonious society; the motivated national spirit helps to strengthen national cohesion; from the positive significance of moral education in schools, there are certain problems in the current moral education: the concept of moral education is old-fashioned, the goals are restricted to abiding by rules, the content is isolated and unitary and the evaluation is imbalanced. Therefore, the society should refer to the content of moral education in Moderation, and enrich the curriculums of moral education in schools. Also, it should refer to the approaches of moral education in Moderation and transform the education pattern in schools. It should also refer to the goals of moral education in Moderation and strengthen the moralities of the educated. Moderation is the product of a specific period and it has its historic limitations. we should understand and look as the moral education ideologies in Moderation correctly, carry forward the essence in it and discard the dross in it bravely; also, we should draw into experiences and lessons so as to serve for the reality and truly realize the modern transition of the moral education in Moderation and realize the true values of traditional culture.